The Changing Fourth Estate
News Coverage today is not what many assume its always been..
“Those who have surrendered their right of the free press have proven their allegiance to the President, but they have betrayed their allegiance to America,” Retired Federal Judge J. Michael Luttig.
Considering the role of the media in our current state of political affairs, it seems many people remember the media as it was in the past and assume it is the same.
The days of Cronkite, Bradley, Rather, Bernstein, and Woodward, to name a few,
are gone. During Watergate, the media held truth to power. A time when we enjoyed strong national newspapers, radio, and television coverage that was credible and reliable.
But all that has changed. We didn’t have the internet. 24/7 cable news operations and social media all competing for our attention... Then the media was mostly locally owned. Today, newspapers are going out of business, and large conglomerates are buying multiple broadcast stations. Further, the number of people working as journalists is down, some reports say by well over 20 percent nationally.
Recently, I have seen reporting about the decline in the number of people watching mainstream media. They are now streaming movies and series. The assumption here is that they are also influenced by social media posts, rather than programs/coverage that they need to think about.
Another concern is the influence of corporate owners in determining news content/coverage. Ownership influence over editorial content has driven many journalists away.
As we see the current administration getting away with so many wrongdoings, I wonder what message this sends to the rest of the country.
I’d love to know where you find credible information.
Thank you, Judge Luttig. Please keep speaking the TRUTH TO POWER.
That’s 30…
I listen.
Not to the tone, not to the spin —
just the story.
The basics.
The bones.
I listen long enough, and the truth reveals itself.
I may run it by AI.
If it seems credible,
I sit with it.
I judge for myself.
The old INFJ one-two.
I’ve found Judge Luttig to be a rare thing —
a voice of clarity,
a constitutional luminary
when so many lights have gone dim.
When all is gone,
the truth will remain.
It will resound like a bell ringing… ding! 🛎️
I get mine from Robert Reich. I think that all AI content should have notices put on them. I saw a beautiful picture of a flower recently and sent it to my daughter who runs a greenhouse at Penn State and she flagged it as being fake. Can’t trust anything anymore. Part of the problem is that Trump named his website Truth Social and he constantly emphasizes the words truth and facts in everything he writes about himself and constantly calls the mainstream media liars and fake news and his MAGA supporters believe him. However, there are never real facts to back up anything he says.